A new documentary highlights the injustices facing the descendants of one of our most celebrated artists.

By John Bailey

25 July 2017 — 12:05pm

Trevor Jamieson was in two minds about meeting the Queen. There were professional reasons: he was in London about to reprise his dazzling lead role in the stage play Namatjira, and with only a week to remount the show a social visit – no matter to whom – was only going to serve as a distraction.

Then there were personal matters. There had been recent deaths in both his own family and that of the Namatjiras, who were with him on the tour. And though both Jamieson and Albert Namatjira's descendants did, in the end, grant the Queen an audience, his role in the show had sown in him a new understanding of the political realities facing Indigenous Australians, and the lady in the crown is far from exempt from that very troubling history.

Trevor Jamieson performs as Albert Namitjira. Credit:Brett Boardman

In this, as in so many ways, Albert Namatjira's story is one that speaks to today. "It has changed my life," Jamieson says of the stage production. "What I think, the views I have of Parliament, what's being done to blackfellas."

Anyone with even a fleeting familiarity with the life of Albert Namatjira would agree that his was a story worth retelling and Big hART's theatre production hit every mark. But while a documentary premiering at this year's Melbourne International Film Festival in part grew from the stage production, it's far more than a straight bio or a theatre-on-film adaptation.

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Albert Namatjira painting in the Australian outback.Credit:Pastor SO Gross, courtesy Strehlow Research Centre

"There were a lot of people that wanted us to make a straight biopic," says producer Sophia Marinos. "I think because people are hungry for the story of Albert Namatjira and that was evident when we toured the play. But for us and for the Namatjiras it was so important for it to be more than that."

The Namatjiras in question are Albert's family, and the doco Namatjira Project is a layered and compelling work that surveys the legacy of one of our most renowned painters with a wide lens. It is only appropriate: Albert Namatjira gained international fame as a painter of watercolour landscapes, and where so many documentaries about artists are little more than portraits, Namatjira Project is concerned with the big picture.

The project began in 2009. "It was a long time ago that we walked into Lenie Namatjira's art centre," says Marinos. "To me, having studied art theory, I was overwhelmed. The Namatjira name is like royalty when you know his history."

Big hART had worked with one of Albert's kinship grandsons on an earlier project. Jamieson and director Scott Rankin were hoping to gain permission from his family to tell the legendary artist's story, but they found that Albert's story was not confined to the past. "There were so many tourists coming through, wanting to see the house that he built, wanting to see the heritage, where he sat in certain parts of the landscape to paint," says Jamieson. "To (the Namatjira family today) it was like, well, there's so much of this happening, how come we don't really see a cent coming our way?"

Albert Namatjira with his wife Rubina, grandchildren and father Jonathon.Credit:Pastor S.O. Gross, courtesy of Strehlow Research Centre

When Albert Namatjira died the copyright to his estate passed to his family, but the administration of his will was given to the Public Trustee for the Northern Territory, which in 1983 sold said copyright on all of his paintings to art dealer John Brackenreg. The ongoing earnings are still in the hands of the Brackenreg family, while Albert's grandchildren are left with nothing.

In its earlier moments, Namatjira Project seems like it will follow the continuing attempts to buy back the copyright, but it quickly becomes a more complex creature. Bounding nimbly between historical moments, it mixes rich archival footage with the colour-drenched scenery of the top end, sequences from the stage show, footage shot on the road and interviews with Albert's family. There's also the small matter of his paintings, too, which gain additional gravity when contrasted with the actual landscapes they captured.

Lenie Namatjira with one of her paintings at Finke River.Credit:Big hART Inc

Marinos, Rankin and the film's director, Sera Davies, were mindful of the fact that they were whitefellas telling the story of Namatjira and his family.

"The film has been made over seven years and a couple of those years were spent gaining a lot of permissions, watching a lot of archival footage, and sometimes not watching archival footage," says Marinos. "Locating it, say, at the Strehlow Research Centre in Alice Springs and having the archivist say 'we don't know if you can watch this or not, so our cultural advisor will take this out to community and watch it with elders and let you know.' Or sometimes watching bits of stuff and then being asked to leave the room in case it's dangerous to be seen."

Kevin and Lenie Namatjira ready to go in to Buckingham Palace to meet the Queen.

The level of involvement with the Namatjiras was so strong that two family members have producer credits on the film. "It's not the whitefella understanding of producer," says Marinos, "but in terms of the cultural advice and permissions and insights that they gave, they were the guiding figures at the helm of the project."

Jamieson, too, sought approval for his portrayal of Albert, but the Namatjira family were never less than welcoming. The journey he undertook making the show was a long one, and the actor who first met the Namatjiras was not the same man who would eventually toss up whether or not to meet the Queen.

Before Namatjira, Jamieson saw his role as that of the performer, putting on a show to take people out of their heads for an hour. "And of course there was my ego, as well. I loved the accolades that came and I loved the compliments and the reviews and all that stuff."

His experiences with the show made him aware of how little has changed though, and how Albert's attempts to improve the lives of his mob were blocked at every turn. It has made Jamieson question where he should be directing his own energies. "Now I'm asking what do I really want to do? Namatjira helped me become much stronger about which way to catapult myself."

When he was invited to return to Albert's legacy for the Namatjira Project, "at first I was like, no, I can't do this any more. I just gave up doing Namatjira, in the end, because of the realisation of what the government's not been doing for us, and I just wish there was a resolution. There's still that question to this day, how can we resolve it? How can we resolve the whole Namatjira legacy?"

Namatjira Project doesn't answer the question, but neither does it end on a tragic note. While the mission to win back copyright continues, the film makes apparent another aspect of Albert's legacy that lives on: his family have continued to paint in his distinct style, and a new generation of young artists is picking up brushes now. "His DNA keeps on through the younger generations," says Jamieson, "and new generations are what matter."

Namatjira Project premieres August 5 at the Melbourne International Film Festival. miff.com.au